lets not live like this
by miller26e
Summary: Sometimes you just need to stay strong in light of bad things. One-shot, Miley-support.


_**Just a short one-shot about everything that has happened recently.**_

**_~xoxo~_**

All she felt these days was pain, just pain and nothing more. There were no emotions attached to her pain, no sadness or bitterness. She guessed that she was numb.

What do you do when your life falls apart? How do you handle it? How do you keep from breaking down every moment of every day?

The answer is, you can't. Maybe you're a special one who can somehow push all of your internal battles aside and somehow come up with a solution to fix your shambled life and then you just go right back to living. But for most people, that is not how it works.

Most people must constantly search their souls for some way out of the pain; some way out of the continuing numbness that engulfs every nerve in their body until they feel as if they are suffocating from the weight of it all.

She felt as if no one could help her, no one could stand by her side. Not that she blamed them for staying as far away as possible from her, lately she had been nothing but trouble. She couldn't expect them to drop what they were doing every time she needed somebody to hold her hand and get her through the tough times.

She couldn't expect her mom to get over her childish ways and be a mom rather than a 'best friend'. Her dad shouldn't have to face her mom. He deserved to have his time away from it all; god only knows all the sacrifices he had made for her over the years. She couldn't expect the boys, or particularly _one_ boy, to come and save her this time. And most of all, Demi shouldn't have to leave _rehab_ just to save her.

No, she had to fix herself on her own.

But how was she supposed to do that when she didn't even know who to trust anymore? Everywhere she turned there was somebody trying to destroy her reputation, which in turn, would destroy her bit by bit.

The young girl (yes, just because she was legal didn't make her any less of a young girl) sat in front of her computer, staring at the articles on her screen. She knew that googling the entire situation wasn't smart; it would most likely just make her even more sad and depressed than she already was, but she couldn't help it.

She sat stationary, her glance rested upon the link to the video. She slowly put her hand on the mouse and dragged it to the _play_ button. Against her better judgment, she pressed it and flinched at the scene that came onto her screen. She didn't even recognize the girl in the video; it wasn't her, or at least who she believed to be her.

How did she let her life get this way? She could blame other people all she wanted, but in the end it all came back to her. She could have chosen a better path in life. Instead of rebelling against everything that defined her as a person, she could have just continued to go with it. She made unnecessary waves and now she was paying for it profusely.

Why didn't she just pick better friends? Ones that didn't offer her some drug that fucked up her mind. They gave it to her with promises that she wouldn't be remotely hurt by it, that it would just give her a sense of euphoria, something that she had been searching forever for. Not to mention the fact that they placed the cherry on top with the assurance that it was one-hundred percent legal in California, which made the offer seem that much more appealing.

Little did she know that those same friends would decide to get information out of her, videotape it, and then send that tape to the tabloids.

Her pathetic self-pitying session was interrupted by a knock at her bedroom door. She jumped at the sound but called for the person behind the door to come in anyway.

Her little sister's sweet face peeked out from behind the door and she looked nervous to come in.

"Noah, you can come in sweetie."

She slowly walked in and closed the door behind her.

"Mom dropped me off, she wanted me to check on you."

"She didn't stay too?"

Noah shook her head, and then paused, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah babe, I'm fine. Why?"

"Daddy called that house and he yelled at mom. I could hear them from my room, or I could hear mom at least. She seemed sad."

"What were they talking about?"

"You and the video and stuff…"

Her eyes went wide. "You know about the video?"

"I do get Internet Miley and I'm not stupid. You told me you would never smoke. You said that you could die because your heart wasn't as strong as the rest of ours."

"I know Noah-bear, and I'm so sorry. I never, ever should have done it. You're absolutely right, I could die if I kept doing so I swear to you that I never will again," she said with as much force in her voice as she could produce. She really did mean what she said.

The little girl sighed and walked over to her older sister. She nestled herself in Miley's embrace. "Do you think everything is going to get better now?"

"Yeah baby, I do think that. We've just got to hold on a little bit longer, okay?"

"Okay…I never liked Anna anyway."

Miley laughed, "Oh really? And why not?"

"Well she wasn't that nice to me, at least not really. Then she was making you different and Demi was friends with her and now she's…you know."

Miley hugged her sister closer to her body. "I'm sorry she was mean to you. But as for Demi and me, she didn't completely cause it."

"You all were friends and now the two of you are messed up and she's fine."

"True, but you know that me and Dem also had some issues before we even met Anna."

"Yeah, I know. I still don't like her," Noah replied stubbornly.

"Can I tell you a secret?"

She replied with a nod.

"I don't like her very much either."

"You won't hang out with her again, right?"

"Right. I swear I won't."

"Good," she smiled. And then a honk was heard from outside and Noah slowly stood up. "That's mom. She said she would drop me off just long enough for her to go to Starbucks."

Miley's first smile in days was melted back into a frown. "Oh…okay. I'll call you later Noah-bear."

"I don't want to leave."

"I know honey, but I don't think mom really wants you spending a lot of me right now. I'm a bad influence."

The girl looked surprised at her words. "No you're not. You're my big sister."

"Well convince mom of that when you get in the car. Now you better go, I don't want mom to have to honk again."

"Okay. Bye Miley, I love you."

Miley sighed, "I love you too."

She watched as her sister walked away. It hurt that her mom refused to talk to her, but at the same time, she couldn't figure out why she did so. Weren't parents supposed to stick by their kids? At least her dad had called her at least once a day since the video leaked.

Speaking of her phone, she figured that she had better check hers to see who had tried to contact her since she turned it off yesterday. Most of the messages she had gotten were short, sorry-for-the-drama ones from friends she had gathered through the years, none from anyone important though.

But she was surprised as she turned on her phone to see that she had six new voicemails. She figured that she had better check them and not avoid them for the rest of the day like she usually did when she got voicemails.

_First voicemail:_

_Hey bud, I just wanted to check in and make sure that you were alright. I know we talked last night before you went to bed but I wanted to call and make sure that you got up this morning. Call me back as soon as you get this message. Love you._

Miley smiled, she loved her dad so much. She knew that he felt bad that he hadn't been around as much in the last year and he blamed part of what was happening on himself, which was completely ridiculous. She made a mental note to call him as soon as she got done with the rest of the messages.

_Next voicemail:_

_Hi Miley! It's Danielle and Kevin. We just wanted to make sure that you were doing okay. We talked to your dad and he's worried about you. If you ever need anyone to talk to, you know where to find us. Call us back soon sweetie!_

'They're so sweet,' she thought to herself. She needed to talk to them more often.

_Next voicemail:_

_Hey…it's Selena. I don't know if you really want to hear from me but I heard about what happened and I want you to know that even if we're not on the best terms, I still consider you a friend and I don't want anything to happen to you. Call me back, or not, whatever you want. Just know that I'm here if you need someone. Bye._

She shot a confused glance at the phone as if it was Selena herself or something. That was definitely weird in her opinion, but maybe she would give her a call one of these days.

_Next voicemail:_

_Miley, Miley, Miley! I cannot believe in a billion, trillion years that I didn't call you sooner. Life has been insane, but I'm calling now and telling you that Ashley and I are taking you out tonight. If you have plans, cancel them. Even though I know you most likely don't have plans because I talked with your father. So I win because now you can't get out of coming out with us! Tell you what; I'll bring the lovely Nick along if you really want me to. Good plan. Call me back and we'll talk out the details. Love you little sis!_

Miley just stood there. That was such a Joe move. Now she was going to have to go out and face that world all because he thought it would be a great idea to get her out and she couldn't even get out of it. Wonderful. At least she would have Nick there and Ashley. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad. Now all she needed was Harry Potter's Cloak of Invisibility to hide her from the paparazzi.

She sighed and clicked for the next message.

_New voicemail:_

_Hey Miles. This is kind of awkward because I should of gotten a hold of you when the video first came out but I figured that you would have wanted some space but now I realize that I'm just an idiot who was avoiding you because I was afraid of facing you. Now you're probably wondering why I was afraid of facing you and the answer to that is because you're probably pissed at me because I should have been there for you for this past year and I wasn't. I let my pride get in the way and I'm sorry. I really hope that you're doing okay and I'll see you tonight no matter what. I'll bring some stuff so I can stay over, I'll sleep on the floor of course._

She heard him pause and his breaths were coming out slowly. But then he spoke the last sentence of his message.

_I love you Miley._

Miley didn't even know what to think about that. She'd overanalyze that message later. She clicked for the last message.

_Last voicemail:_

_OH MY GOD, MILEY! It's me, your best friend ever who is totally not allowed to use her cell phone in rehab but begged her doctor to let her just this once because I had to let you know that I was thinking about you and that I love you. I heard some girls down the hall from me talking about what happened and I flipped. I flipped more than the girls flipped when they realized who I was. I forced them to tell me everything that happened and now I'm here. I've got to tell you, it took me forever to convince the nurse who then had to convince the doctor. I think I threatened to run away somewhere along the lines to get this phone call._

Miley giggled at Demi's extremely fast talking and excitement over the fact she was able to use her phone.

_I'm going to finish up this message because this one nurse who I can't stand is glaring at me and it's freaking me out. Anyway, I love you so, so much and I know you're so strong so there is no doubt in my mind that you're going to get through this. You are so amazing and talented and completely and totally loved. Love you best friend. Stay strong. Oh by the way, I stole your slippers. I hope you don't mind._

She couldn't stop smiling. Miley literally, physically could not stop smiling as she hung up the phone.

Yeah, she was going to be okay.

_**~xoxo~**_

**So I got the idea from the song Crushcrushcrush by Paramore. Even though the song doesn't really have anything to do with the situation...just some of the lines got to me, which gave me the inspiration for not only the story, but the title as well (it's a line from the song). Tell me what you think about the one-shot, the whole situation with Miley, anything you want. I don't know if this one-shot exactly shows what I think about the video of her smoking because what I think...I don't know. I can't really put it into words which is weird. I don't hate her for it by any means, but I do think that it was stupid of her.**

**Anyway, obviously things in the story aren't accurate. Like Miley is not in LA and there's no proof that Anna sold the tape (I don't even know if I believe she did, but I kind of do) and some other stuff that I can't remember. I wrote it in like an hour because I wanted to write something about it and I got inspiration. So review, or don't. Whatever you want. :) A new chapter of Back to Home should be up soon and I'm writing the next chapter of Broken Smile now. Happy Holidays!**

**follow me on twitter/ imagineyourlife**


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